


Come Sleep, O Sleep! The Certain Knot Of Peace

by Koan_abyss



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Early Days, Established Relationship, M/M, Sleep
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-23
Updated: 2020-08-23
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:20:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,843
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26065642
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Koan_abyss/pseuds/Koan_abyss
Summary: Sleeping beside Gregory is an experience, reflects Mycroft, a night
Relationships: Mycroft Holmes/Greg Lestrade
Comments: 4
Kudos: 59





	Come Sleep, O Sleep! The Certain Knot Of Peace

**Author's Note:**

  * A translation of [Come Sleep, O Sleep! The Certain Knot Of Peace](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18584743) by [Koan_abyss](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Koan_abyss/pseuds/Koan_abyss). 



> A second experiment: I've tried to translate another one of my fics.  
> I'm no translator and English is not my native language, so you're going to find a lot of mistakes, I'm afraid. Corrections are welcome!

Sleeping beside Gregory is an experience, reflects Mycroft, a night. Not that he feels like sleeping, now.

It is two in the morning and his whole attention (his exterminate attention, all of his analytical skills and that little of emotional intelligence he managed to develop during his life) is captured by the vision of Gregory asleep.

The man being incline to touch and closeness even while sleeping is not a surprise to Mycroft: Gregory is warm and affectionate, awake, easy-going and friendly, in life, and Mycroft saw him reining in that side of his character exclusively on the job, because of obvious matters of regulations.

Hell, the man manages to make look normal even touching Sherlock! Sherlock, who seems made of glass and sharp turns when on drugs. And Gregory could always reach to him, making it look like the most natural thing in the world resting a hand on his shoulder, holding his arm to be sure he was paying attention.

(Mycroft does not even dream of touching Sherlock: it would be stiff, tentative, pretentious. Sherlock would read his intentions and back off before Mycroft could even reach out.)

After their first encounters, somehow still unsure and cautious, Gregory got more confident, showing Mycroft all of his tendency to touch even when they are not engaging in intercourse: he puts his hand on Mycroft’s waist before kissing him hello, he strokes his back passing by, sometimes he squeezes his knee when sitting side by side; but Gregory has a way to look at him, also, that makes Mycroft’s skin tingle, like those brown eyes were already promising the incoming sensations of his hands laying on Mycroft. When he is with Gregory, Mycroft feels surrounded by touch.

At night, in his sleep, this feeling is even more highlighted. Even sound asleep, Gregory reaches for him, if one of them moved away from the center of the bed.

When Mycroft is sleeping on his side, turned away, Gregory plasters himself to his back. An arm around his chest or waist, his pelvis against Mycroft’s, his face pressed into Mycroft’s nape. Mycroft could never prevent a shudder of excitement, that position inevitably linked in his memory to the first time Gregory came to his house, the first time Gregory take him that way (and from the collected data, Mycroft believes that Gregory makes the same mental association: it is rarely they manage to sleep more than an hour or two like that, before one of them start teasing the other).

If Mycroft is facing him, then Gregory will snuggle little by little in Mycroft’s arms, pushing a leg between Mycroft’s, or throwing an arm around his shoulders and stroking his back, to the rhythm of his dreams. 

If Mycroft is laying on his stomach, he knows that during the night he will awake for few minutes to find Gregory covering him like a bearskin, puffing hot breath in Mycroft’s ear.

Undoubtedly, Mycroft’s light sleep is perturbed from this fumbling and groping in the dark, being manhandled and shoved around like a teddy bear by an unaware Gregory Lestrade looking for warm and comfort. But Mycroft feels amused by it, also.

They do not share a bed so often that having his sleep disrupted by short span of consciousness to take note that yes, those are just Gregory’s hands, everything is fine, could be a real nuisance to Mycroft.

Usually Gregory stays over during the weekend, when is not his turn to have his daughters (and, recently, when Mycroft is back from one of his extended travels).

If someone had asked Mycroft, before he had firsthand experience of it, how much would have bothered him sharing his space with a man so hungry for contact, he would have greatly exaggerated his estimate (the thought is slightly annoying. He hates miscalculating every kind of evaluation. Especially those about himself!). Within his admittedly scarce experience of intimate relationships, sleeping almost regularly beside someone else has never happened.

And, if is not surprising that Gregory is as much affectionate in sleep as during his awake hours, is astonishing that Mycroft appreciate it to such an extent that, not only he is not disturbed by it, but he is having trouble to fall asleep again, now that Gregory is not touching him.

Gregory is laying on his back, an arm stuck under the pillow, snoring slightly: it must be what has awaken Mycroft. But at this point is half an hour that Mycroft is studying him, propped on his side, his head resting on his fisted hand, and despite the rhythmic and familiar sound of Gregory’s snores, sleep has no intention to come back to him.

He stares at Gregory’s chest raising and falling alongside his breathing: it would be so easy to slip by his side and rest his head on it, laying a hand on the dark hairs and close his eyes.

But it is something he is allowed to do? Does he dare get closer and touch Gregory, acting so casually with his lover’s body, mimic the confident way Gregory touches him lightly, because he wants to and knows that his hand is welcome? Would not be a catastrophe is Mycroft were to wake up Gregory, brushing against him? If his touch were to be stiff, tentative, pretentious, making Gregory flinch?

Better to renounce.

But sleep is gone, and Gregory is right under his eyes, warm, snug and absolutely perfect, sleeping with his mouth open. Mycroft has to touch him, he craves to wake up in a bundle of calmness and coziness, brown eyes rubbed in torpor and rough kisses.

He gathers up the courage and cross the mattress, slowly, watching carefully Gregory’s face and keeping an ear out for any creaking and rustling from the bed.

He congratulates himself for accomplishing the manoeuvre in perfect silence: he could reach Gregory getting just an inch closer, reaching out with his hand and resting it on his chest, if he would just relax and lean against the man beside him.

He raises his hand slowly, looking out for every variation in Gregory’s breath, and he hovers stupidly half an inch from his skin. Softly, softly, he lays his fingertips first and then his palm on him.

Mycroft thinks he once disarmed a bomb with less caution.

Even slower than before he leans in and lowers his ear to Gregory’s chest.

Gregory doesn’t awake and doesn’t pull away; his warmth and his heartbeat reach Mycroft in a second. Mycroft sighs deeply and melts, laying against him.

Yes, that is, he thinks in a rush of gleaming perfection.

Then Gregory’s snoring stops and Mycroft freezes: Gregory is moving under him.

An arm frees itself from under the pillow and Mycroft finds himself enveloped by strong arms, while Gregory murmurs something, squeezing Mycroft to his chest and kissing his head.

“My…” Mycroft can make out, in the string of unintelligible words Gregory’s brain generates casually to disperse that sudden and useless energy surge, and put him back to sleep. “My.”

Then Gregory speaks no more and his breath becomes again deep and slow.

Mycroft finally relaxes, while the same happens to him.

The next morning Gregory’s cellphone rings at 7:45 and he grabs it with a suffering groan.

“Lestrade,” he slurs. He kisses distractedly Mycroft’s shoulder while disengaging from the sheets and stands. “No, that’s not us. I don’t know, Gregson, maybe. _Of course_ you couldn’t bother Gregson on saturday morning.”

When he is back in the room, few minutes later, Mycroft is ready to get up. “Breakfast?” he suggests.

It is clear that Gregory does not have to go back to Scotland Yard: he got inside with an easy smile and his eyes immediately went to the bed, instead of the bathroom’s door or his clothes.

“Sure,” he smiles. “Sorry for wakenin’ you…”

“I would have been awake all the same in few minutes,” remembers him Mycroft fastening his robe. “It is not a problem.”

“I have noticed something,” Gregory says at the breakfast table, when Mycroft get downstairs completely dressed. He makes a small wince to Mycroft’s raised eyebrow. “I’m… quite clingy, eh? While sleeping. Probably when I’m awake, too, but this morning I was really squeezing you madly,” he goes on with a grin.

“You are very touch-driven,” Mycroft agrees without actually committing.

“Ok. I can hold it back a little, if-“

“Do you think that if your behavior were to make me uncomfortable, I would suffer in silence?” Mycroft interrupts him. He suffers silently exclusively because of _his own_ behaviors. Not even all the time, if one were to listen to Anthea. “I can assure you I do not feel a vocation for martyrdom. Except for Sherlock related issues, naturally,” he sighs.

Gregory huffs and get closer. “I know that _this_ doesn’t bother you,” he says interlacing their fingers, with a little smile, “but it doesn’t mean you should wake up in the middle of the night in my gorilla grip…”

Mycroft hesitates: acknowledging he appreciates Gregory hunger for touch is one thing; it is a different matter to admit it with him. That would mean voicing a need (a need? A preference, barely…) and Mycroft does not believes himself up to the task.

“You can push me away, maybe, there’s no risk to wake me up,” goes on Gregory, “or keep my hand on the sheets or the pillows, so I’ll grab them, that should work… I used to drive Becky mad, in the summer…”

Gregory keeps talking, made anxious by Mycroft’s silence, eyeing his face in search of the proof is saying the right thing or the wrong one, and Mycroft realizes that if he does not do anything, Gregory will just keep babbling on, panicking.

“Gregory,” he calls, squeezing his hand. “It does not drive me mad. It is not a bother. You are not clingy,” he states. ‘Add that you appreciates it, that it makes you feel safe, that you love it,” suggests something inside him. “Please, do not worry about it.”

Gregory is still studying him, intent. Then he nods. “Yeah. Sorry. But sometimes I’ve to ask if everything’s alright.”

Of course, Gregory needs to know if everything is all right. The thought of problems he is unaware of, of someone looking for solutions away from him, behind his back… Mycroft should have come to that conclusion sooner: he cannot pretend Gregory gathers everything is all right, that Mycroft is happy, not after the affair.

“Everything is splendidly fine,” he reassures him and Gregory smiles and kisses him.

Mycroft takes advantage of the gesture to clutch at his shoulders. “I must confess,” he murmurs on Gregory’s lips, “that I have discovered I appreciate your ‘gorilla grip’.”

Gregory bursts out laughing. “Really?”

“Mh.”

Maybe it is not much of a confession, but Gregory seems to understand. And it is good to know that Gregory is not a light sleeper, even when someone shoves at him. It is going to make Mycroft’s decision to lay on his chest way easier, in the future.

**Author's Note:**

> The title come from this poem:  
> Come, Sleep! O Sleep, the certain knot of peace,  
> The baiting-place of wit, the balm of woe,  
> The poor man's wealth, the prisoner's release,  
> Th' indifferent judge between the high and low;  
> With shield of proof shield me from out the press  
> Of those fierce darts Despair at me doth throw!  
> O make in me those civil wars to cease!—  
> I will good tribute pay if thou do so.  
> Take thou of me smooth pillows, sweetest bed,  
> A chamber deaf of noise and blind of light,  
> A rosy garland, and a weary head;  
> And if these things, as being thine in right,  
> Move not thy heavy grace, thou shalt in me,  
> Livelier than elsewhere, Stella's image see.  
> Sir Philip Sidney


End file.
